Cancellations

[Mary4101]

I had a cancellation by AIRBNB  just yesterday saying it was due to quality assurance information they received regarding the guest.  I was totally fine with that, they are looking out for the host. Here is where the problem started a few hours after that I received a booking for the same dates, same amount of quest, same location the only difference was that this one was booked by a male not a female.  I called Airbnb and shared all of this information with them and my concerns that this booking was tied to the other booking that they just cancelled. They looked into it and said that it was just coincidence, but if I wanted to cancel I could and there would be fees and so on and so on.  I just called them back, because I looked up the guest number on the new reservation and it belongs to the female that they cancelled the reservation. And this is what they told me THAT DOESN'T MEAN THAT THEY ARE LINKED IN ANYWAY, IF I WANT TO CANCEL I CAN AND IT WILL EFFECT MY RATING AND I WILL PAY A  FINED. Are you kidding me they are not linked, they will not let me speak to a supervisor.

 Has anyone been able to speak to a supervisor at Airbnb?

[Emiel1]

@Mary4101 

Supervisor at Airbnb:

"These guests are not linked to each other, they are only married with each other".

You: "OK, thank you, now i feel much safer".

[Sarah977]

@Mary4101  Airbnb's responses totally suck. You may not need to talk to a supervisor, just try contacting again as if you haven't spoken to them about this before and hopefully you'll get a more savvy and helpful rep next time. Drop in the phrase "host safety", telling them you don't feel safe with this booking.

Have you used up all your 3 free IB cancellations? 

I just don't understand why so many hosts are loathe to turn off IB, rather than have to deal with cancellations after the fact. If you required guests to send booking requests, your gut feeling about this booking, before you ever even saw the same phone number, would then have meant you could have simply declined the booking.

[Super47]

@Mary4101

You couldn't make it up... 🙄

@Sarah977

While I'd imagine that most hosts would dearly love to turn off IB, the absolute fact is that in many saturated markets (ie most markets these days), they haven't a hope of getting booked if they turn IB off. And yes, you'll get the occasional host that will say, "Oh but I turned it off and it didn't affect my bookings at all" - that may very well be the case in some instances, due to a number of variables. But for most, no IB = no bookings. Simple as that. And after the year we've all just had, very few can afford the luxury of taking any steps that could potentially cost them bookings. 

[Helen3]

I operate in a highly saturated market in a major city and didn’t use IB for three years @Super47 

What difference did you find between having it on or not? 

I don’t get many more bookings than I had when I didn’t use IB.

And as a guest it certainly doesn’t put me off booking if someone doesn’t use IB.

Also I can’t seem to see any listings attached to your profile... are you a host?? 

Love to see links to the research you are quoting where you state ‘it is an absolute fact that you won’t get any bookings if you don’t use IB.’

[Super47]

As a major city, with only 1486 active listings (of which just 549 are private room rentals), Bristol most certainly wouldn't be classed as a highly saturated market, or anywhere even remotely close to it, @Helen3 

[Super47]

@Helen3

And yes, I'm a host. Very much so. 

[Charles224]

@Super47 Hi Penelope, your profile shows no properties or reviews and you started in 2020.. I can see that @Helen3 has a genuine point.

[Super47]

@Charles224

There are many reasons why one may choose to preserve their anonymity on a publicly accessible forum, and unless there are rules in place on such a forum to forbid users from doing so (which clearly there aren't on this one), a person is perfectly within their rights to post under whatever profile they wish, without being subjected to an inquisition.

With such a warm 'welcome', it really is little wonder that there are so few active users in this community, in comparison to other comparable discussion groups. 

[Helen3]

What reasons would they be @Super47 ?

Genuine question 😁

And why do you see it as an inquisition to be asked a simple question? It’s a reasonable one.

Personally if I see someone hiding behind an anonymous profile - they lose all credibility.

You could be anyone - a host with awful reviews, an airbnb management company touting for clients, a disgruntled Airbnb staff member for example or someone who wants to be a keyboard warrior hiding behind the cloak of anonymity. Being able to see someone’s listing establishes trust and credibility.  

It is incredibly rare for anyone here to create a false profile to post here. 

[Helen3]

That’s your opinion. @Super47  The number of STRs have grown threefold in recent years in Bristol and it is indeed an over-saturated market in terms of accommodation  demands versus supply  for this type of accommodation. 

Quoting Airdna figures on ‘active listings’ doesn’t as you know tell you the real picture of how many listings there are in a city, as many STR remain closed under Covid, particularly shared homes. 

What impact did it have in your listings  when you changed from having IB to not having IB?

[Super47]

@Helen3

It just so happens, I did previously mention my reasons for needing to preserve my anonymity to some perfectly lovely and welcoming community members when I first started posting in the Community Centre - but I certainly won't be reiterating them to someone like yourself who from what I've already noted in my short time here, makes something of a habit of greeting new posters with dismissive, abrupt and extremely judgemental comments. I can assure you, that certainly doesn't do a whole lot for your own credibility.

Yes, I could be anyone. I could be Brian Chesky, or I could be Beyonce, or I could be Boris Johnson. And what, pray tell, concern is that of yours? Other less inquisitive souls can make up their own minds in relation to my trustworthiness and credibility based on the content I post, rather than on some inexplicable desire to know my seed, breed and generation.

And quoting Airdna active listing figures is of course relevant - your "highly saturated" reference was in the present tense, as was my response. 

Finally, your repeated question as to what impact having or not having IB had on my listings is just too inane to deserve a reply. The answer to that is patently obvious from my earlier post upthread.

So I suggest you go seek out some other hapless new poster to take your superiority complex out on. You're barking up the wrong tree here. 

[Helen3]

I certainly don’t greet new posters in the ways you alledge  as anyone looking at the advice I post will see. @Super47 

Sorry you feel the need to make such nasty and unfair comments.

The only new poster I have questioned in yourself as you have chosen to hid behind an anonymous profile.

Always easy to make these sort of barbed, untrue comments hiding under the cloak of annoymity isn’t it ? 😢😢😢

[Super47]

Based on what I've seen in just a few weeks, I don't think there's anything unfair or untrue about my comments at all @Helen3. Just yesterday, you were greeting yet another newcomer to the forum with that same derisive, judgemental tone that I've noticed you use on several other threads where you've been addressing new posters. Perhaps if you were a little more welcoming, and a little less presumptuous, you might receive a more congenial response from new members who have every bit as much right to be here, as you have. 

I rest my case..

https://community.withairbnb.com/t5/Hosting/AirBnB-investment-in-Dubai-possible-to-rent/td-p/1349232

[Sarah977]

@Super47  Yes, I understand about the highly saturated markets in some places. But if more hosts decided to turn off IB, they'd all be on the same playing field. And that might just happen, at least it would be the smart thing for hosts to do en masse, if Airbnb keeps having "glitches" where guests who didn't meet the host's IB criteria (been reading about a lot of those lately)  and refuse to allow cancellations of IB bookings like the one that started this post, which are quite obviously, to all but the CS rep, sketchy and scammy.